Clinton in Wonderland
by JaycenMackenzie
Summary: Curiouser and curiouser! Clint Barton is lured down to a strange land with talking mice, bodiless billionaires, and many other odd creatures who seem to know who he is. He is unwittingly enlisted to defeat the Red Queen. But someone is trying to stop him.. someone he loved. Will he be able to overcome his emotions, or will they hinder him from saving Wonderland?


"_Oh, no. No, no, no. We have to go! Clinton! Clint, wake up!_"

_Her voice fades away as his vision darkens, the pain in his abdomen intensifying. He barely feels the first strike across his left cheek. The second one comes, harder this time, and his head jerks violently against the cobblestone road. Still, he can't open his eyes. _

_His breath comes in laboured pants, his body spasming in his automatic effort to sit up. Fresh blood spills from his stomach wound, the warmth spreading and seeping through his clothes. Gritting his teeth, he forces his eyes open, determined to see, even if he can't get up. _

_Glowing eyes catch his, desperate and wild, and filled with tears. _

_There's a loud, earsplitting screech, and there's a heavy blow on the back of his head, then everything goes black._

AAAAAAA

She is beautiful. Long, flowing blonde hair that shimmers under the pulsing lights of the club, a pretty, heart-shaped face and enticing lips. Her curves are accentuated by her body-hugging, bright red, above-the-knee dress. But the most prominent part of her are her eyes – irises a beautiful shade of blue, framed by a generous set of eyelashes.

After passing him by, the sweet scent of her perfume intoxicating, she weaves through the crowd of dancers and he loses sight of her, her small stature hidden in the throng. He follows her, finally catching sight of her shimmering hair. A new song comes on, the bass beating as fast his heart as he pursues Blue Eyes.

Finally, she turns down a dark, narrow corridor and vanishes into the shadows. He quickens his pace, his normally agile feet stumbling over the rough, uneven carpet. With no qualms or thoughts of what could lay behind in the darkness, he jogs through a stone archway, and suddenly finds himself blind. Even with his impeccable eyesight, he is engulfed in utter and complete darkness.

"Hello? Miss?" he calls out, turning in circles. "Blue Eyes?"

There's no response. Still determined to find the woman, he continues to amble around. The room seems endless, though he can tell by the dank smell and lack of wind that he is still indoors.

He realizes that he can't hear the music anymore, despite the intensity of it just before the arch. Strange.

Just then, he feels a tugging from his navel, pulling him to his right. Five strides later and the ground disappears beneath his feet.

In freefall, he does nothing but scream the first thirty seconds. When he doesn't land after a minute, he finds himself quite bored. Still in utter darkness, he only has the sound of wind rushing past his ears to let him know that he is indeed still falling.

Finally, after what feels like hours later, the darkness begins to lighten like a gradient from black to yellow. Basked in the sallow glow, he sees that the walls around him are made of dirt, and concludes that he's fallen down a hole in the ground. What a rabbit hole was doing in a nightclub completely befuddles him.

_Rabbit_ hole. Where did that come from? The gears in his mind turn and turn, only for his thoughts to become foggy and muddled. He then stops trying to think as it makes his head pound.

The dirt walls fly past in a blur, and he gets dizzy. His stomach is flip-flopping madly still, and he feels as if he is going to be sick. Just as he's about to vomit, he hits ground, landing roughly on his knees, but not flattened like a pancake as he thought he'd be.

Groaning, he clutches his abdomen, finally throwing up. After he empties the contents of his stomach, he wipes his mouth on his shirt sleeve, then surveys his surroundings. He's in a circular room, with walls of shining metal and floors of the same material. It's empty, save for a glass table with two hamburgers on silver platters. The most peculiar thing, he noted, are the eight doors, identical height and width, all made of various materials ranging from mahogany to clay.

Patting the pockets of his jeans, he realizes his phone is missing, but doesn't panic – he doubts there's any service down here anyway. (For some reason, at the time, he isn't worried about going back up. Later, he would realize that he should have noticed the lack of worry.)

He then remembers the reason he fell into the hole in the first place: _Blue Eyes_.

Was she down here? If so, which door did she go through?

"_Over here!_"

Clint whirls around at the noise. "Who's there?"

"_Eat the burger!_"

Using his sharp sense of hearing, he pinpoints the voice. It came from a tiny door to his left. He crouched down so he was at eyelevel with the doorknob.

"_Eat the burger!_" the little voice repeated. It came from behind the door.

He gets back up and stood at the table, staring at the hamburgers. They are almost identical, except one has sesame seeds on top and the other has none. Which burger should he eat? Both seem delicious; the buns smell fresh and the meat looks juicy.

Turning back to the small door, he whispers, "Which one?" (Once again, he later realizes how strange it is that he's talking to a door without any apprehension.)

Only silence is the response. He sighs, hoping that the hamburger with the sesame seeds is the right burger. He still doesn't know it will do to him. With a generous bite (he was hungry) he savours the succulent taste of the burger.

The second he swallows, he braces himself for whatever is supposed to happen. With eyes squeezed shut and fists clenched, he realizes that he feels no different. Scanning the parts of him he can see and feeling his face up, nothing seems changed.

Then, with all the abruptness of a gunshot, the table towers ten feet above him. He yelps in shock. "What just-"

"_Over here!_"

He hurries over to the miniature door – regular sized, actually, as it's now the right height for him. Jiggling the knob, he finds it locked.

"_Do you have the key?_"

"What key? I don't have a key."

"_It's up on the damn table. You have to climb back up-"_

With a firm kick to the keyhole, he breaks the door open.

"_Or you can just do that._"

Bursting out onto the other side, he finds himself face-to-face with a mouse. It's a typical mouse, one would see in your garage... except he is literally face-to-face with it. The rodent's pink snout is inches away from his own nose, its long whiskers, three on each side, tickling his face. Its beady eyes, one bigger, darker and less focused than the other, are staring curiously at him, slightly unnerving as it looked expectant as well.

"Is it Clinton?" the mouse says, startling him.

He feels a pinch on his shoulder. Stumbling backwards as he sees a second, smaller and less imposing mouse, he falls against a tree trunk.

"Are you Clinton?" The second mouse with grey fur, instead of dark brown, pushes its snout into his face.

"He can't be, smart one – his nose is too big."

He subconsciously pats his face. "Yes, I am. I'm Clinton. Well, Clint, actually. Are you real? Actual talking mice?"

It was as if Clint had never spoken: the mice are bickering still, though their eyes never leave his face. Then, the tree trunk moves against his back and he whirls around, automatically crouching in a fighting position, ready to pounce at any sign of a threat.

The thin green trunk trembles again, and Clint follows the movement up, his eyes landing on a giant orange flower petal. Attached to the petal is a large, yellow face – a wide nose and deep-set eyes rimmed with thin, wire glasses.

"If he's _the _Clinton, why is he still here?" the flower says, its eyes glaring at Clint.

A flower on Clint's other side twists to face the orange one. "He should know where to go. If he doesn't, then he can't be the Clinton. Ain't that right, Sitwell?"

Sitwell purses his lips. "Well, Rumlow, he is _still _standing here."

"I can leave, if you want, since my presence bothers you so much." Clint begins to head down the dirt path, about to step into the thicket of extremely tall grass, when one of the mice calls after him.

"Wait!" The first mouse, scampers toward him. "You can't hope to defeat him alone!"

Clint freezes in his tracks. "Defeat who?"

"The Queen. The Red Queen."

AAAAAAA

Now, Clinton has had many adventures, most of them ending in him running for his life, with fiery explosions behind and around him like a soundtrack to his near-death experiences. No matter how close he gets to death, whether it is in a form of fire, a gunshot wound, or an arrow to the chest, he always manages to survive.

The reason for that is because of his partner, N –

A searing pain rips through his mind, not his brain, as he can feel his thoughts being torn up, like paper through a shredder. He only manages to glimpse a flash of red, then everything is gone.

All that's left is the view in front of him: a rusting wrought-iron archway, surrounded on either side with prickly thorns. But past the archway is what made him think of his near-death adventures.

It is a typical version of Hell – minus the fire... so far.

The tall fence of thorns doesn't stop at the arch, but travels far past it, as far as Clint can see (and he can see quite a distance). Other vegetation includes a few leave-less, pathetic-looking branches that try to pass off for trees, straw tumbleweeds floating through the air, and red sand, blowing like in the Sahara.

The land is flat, curiously, even with the sand dancing around. It goes on for miles, with seemingly no end, only stopping at the straight horizon where grey skies meet red ground.

"It's the Bloody Desert." The grey mouse scurries up beside Clint.

"It damn well is a bloody desert." Clint stands on his toes, squinting into the desert.

The mouse with dark brown fur makes a sound of displeasure. "No, no. It's _the _Bloody Desert. And no, it's not just 'cause the sand's red. Otherwise, it could've been named 'Cherry Sands' if anything. The sands actually contain blood."

At Clint's horrified expression, the grey mouse lays a hand on his shoulder, a surprisingly human gesture. "The Red Queen had a twin brother. They once ruled beside one another as equals. Then, one day, there came the time when only one could wear the crown, and of course, her brother was the one who did. The Queen was not happy about that. So, she killed her brother, turning his body into sand and spreading it across the land he once owned."

"Are they a pair of giants or something?" Clint chuckles breathily, though the story did nothing to reassure him. "How can his body fill an endless desert? And how are tumbleweeds flying?"

The dark brown mouse grimaces. "Magic." It turns to the other mouse. "This can't be Clinton! He wouldn't be so stupid."

"Hey, hold up." Clint steps between them, a little more than insulted. "I'm not going to stand around and be snubbed by two _rodents_. Now, I'm crossing this desert with, or without the two of you."

He isn't quite sure what makes him suddenly so confident; for all he knew, there were giant man-eating lizards hiding under all that bloody sand. The dangers suddenly become so real, and he hesitates before stepping under the arch.

With a deep breath, he steps into the red sand – only to be held back by both mice.

"We're not letting you go alone." The grey mouse bows. "My name is Phillip. This," he points to the other mouse," is Nicholas."

Clint turns to the mouse called Nicholas.

"I ain't bowing to you." Nicholas spins around and scampers ahead of them, onto the red sand, through a narrow path bordered by thorns.

Phillip prods Clint. He steps into the desert, half-expecting to sink into the sand, or for something to eat his foot off. Nothing happens – it's just regular sand. He takes another step, surer this time, and it's like walking on a beach. Only there's no water or sunset dipping below the horizon. As well, his only two companions are talking mice and the sand is made of a former king's remains.

"So the Red Queen. How bad is she?" Clint is tired and dehydrated and out of breath, the place sucking his energy out much faster than ever before; the words come out in pants. They've been walking for a while now, the gate far behind them, only a speck in the distance. The path disappeared some time ago, the thorns sparse now. Still, they're no closer to the end of the desert.

"You mean besides the story that says she killed her brother? Oh, she's a delight. Beheadings every week, taxes in the kingdom being raised monthly – not that we pay anything – and demanding that only cake be eaten on Sundays." Nicholas scowls, his fur bristling. "Mice don't eat cake."

All of a sudden, the sand in front of them disappears... to reveal a giant chasm, half-a-mile across. Clint glances over the edge and sees black. It's endless, just like the desert. _Great._

"Either of you have wings?" Clint glances at the mice who seem flabbergasted.

Phillip's nose twitches. "This wasn't here before." He turns to the other mouse. "Did you know about this?"

"Why the hell would I know about this? I've been with you the whole time."

Clint holds up his hands, stepping between the two mice. "So what do we do now? Do you happen to have a grapple hook attached to an arrow with strong rope? A bow would be nice, as well. Also, I could go for some pizza right about now."

They turned to him with identical perplexed expressions. Apparently, mice don't have the same sense of humour as humans.

Out of nowhere, there is a chuckle, followed by a loud burst of laughter. Clint is positive he didn't laugh, and he's sure the bemused mice didn't make a sound either.

"This is quite a predicament, isn't it, boys? Oh, Clinton, what will you do without your spy toys?" said an airy voice in a sing-song tone. "These narrow-minded mice know not what to do. So, Clinton, oh, Clinton, _I'll help if you want me to_."

Whirling around as the last words are whispered in his ear, Clint shouts out, "Who's there?"

"It's me, you dunce. I'm sure you've met me at least once."

Nicholas exhales noisily. "Come out, Stark. Show yourself."

There's a responding sigh, then a bodiless head appears. "Hello, my acquaintances. Uh... something about pretenses – um..." The bearded face scrunches up in annoyance as it fumbles for words. "This rhyming thing isn't as easy as it seems. Screw trying to be mysterious. Anyway, I can help you imbeciles for a price."

Clint, a little perturbed at talking to a floating head, takes a while to answer. "Who are you?" he asks, squinting at the smug, but tired face.

"Anthony Edward Stark at your service." He bows his head, and a wide, white teeth grin spreads across his jovial face. "But you can call me Tony."

"And how are you...?" Clint gestures at the empty air beneath Tony's head.

With his nose twitching anxiously, Phillip pipes up: "Why are you here, Tony?"

"I have to aid in the 'saviour's' quest and all. It's for my best interest, really." Tony's body materialises, clothed in a crisp, black suit and tie. He looks like a normal human, save for his pupils, which are slits like a cat's. Holding his arms out, he looks expectantly at the other three. "Well, grab onto a limb. The Red Queen isn't going to wait for you to stop her."

"How did you know –?"

Tony rolls his eyes. "I know everything, I see everything, and I hear everything. No one can keep secrets from this guy." He points cockily to himself. "Now, grab on to my arms."

The two mice and Clint comply, awkwardly grasping tightly at Tony's arms. Clint shudders as a tingly sensation passes through his whole body. He glances down and shouts out; he's invisible. He knows his legs are dangling freely as they float across the chasm, but he can't see them. Hopefully, his shoes don't fall off.

As soon as they land on the other side, they're tossed not-so-gently onto the grass, Clint rolling until he hit a large rock.

Nicholas' swearing is muffled by the soil his head is buried in. Phillip stumbles away from the cliff, scurrying up to his mouse friend, who was struggling to get free.

"Now, that you've done trying to maim us," the brown-furred mouse pulls his head out of the ground with Phillip's help and glares at a smirking Tony, "there's no need for you to be here anymore."

"Wow." Tony's eyes widen in fake hurt. "After all I've done for you. I even let you grab the sleeves of my Brioni." He smiles broadly, then he gradually disappears: his body first, and next, his head. Then, he's gone.

With peace and quiet at last, Clint is able to properly survey their surroundings. It is a complete opposite of the desert they were just carried out of. The sky is a beautiful shade of light blue, with wispy white clouds occasionally striping across. There's lush, emerald green grass covering every square inch of the rolling hills that Clint can see. Growing on the land are various, wonderful-smelling flowers and great, big, healthy-looking trees that can provide shade for a thirty people.

_Probably what heaven looks like_, Clint thinks to himself, fighting the ridiculous urge to lie in the shadow of a tall oak tree on the luscious grass. He turns to the mice. "Where do we go now?"

Nicholas wipes some dirt off his snout. "South."

Normally, finding directions is no problem for Clint, but in this strange world, he isn't sure his navigational senses will work. He glances at his wrist, not surprised to see his watch is missing.

There's no sun in the sky, just a general direction where the light originates – his right. How the hell is he supposed to navigate with no sun?

Suddenly, in the corner of his vision, there's a flash of gold. He spins on his heel, spinning once, one-hundred-and-eighty degrees, and finding nothing out of place. Then, he turns again.

Not ten-feet away from him is a woman. A blonde woman. With blue eyes.

There's a name. A flicker of five letters across his vision, and he is so stunned, he almost trips over his feet. It's not the first time that day he'd been taken aback, but this is a different kind of surprise.

It's one from the real world.

_Bobbi._


End file.
